The Negro problem, if there is any in the country, from an industrial standpoint may be resolved into two phases. In the South the race is allowed unfettered opportunity in almost all trades and occupations. Whatever other crimes she may be guilty of, she allows the colored people to work. There we find colored men who take large contracts for the erection of public buildings. Most of the finest hotels, private residences, and business blocks represent the work of colored labor from foundation to roof. In a recent visit to the black belt of Alabama I was told that in a certain town colored mechanics had constructed the courthouse and every other important building within the corporate limits. A Southern white man, pointing out this fact, remarked that such a thing would be impossible in the North. So strong is the prejudice against the employment of Negro labor that the presence of the Negro workmen on a brick wall would cause every white man to throw down his trowel and quit work. This thing is true in all the remunerative avenues of life in the North. In respect to the South, it is there that the Negro will work out his industrial destiny. He has been and will be the laborer. Such schools as Tuskegee and Hampton will prepare him to compete with other people in all trades. We speak so often of the "New South." It is time that we had a "New North." The Northern people, as generous as they have been in founding schools for the freedmen, seem to love them best at a distance. The North will educate us, but will not allow us to work. We need education, but we also need opportunity for industrial progress. We want a fair chance in the race of life. How can we ever make any headway if we are all shut up to one or two lines of service? A citizen of the town some time ago said to me that years ago the Negro and the Irishman came to Princeton with nothing. The Irishman has accumulated real estate, but the Negro still has nothing. One of the reasons is simply this: the Irishman has ten chances to the colored man's one. What is true of this community is practically true of the whole North. (Rev. J. Q. Johnson, in the Christian Recorder, Philadelphia, Pa.)
The Negro question is but another name for the labor problem in the South; and it is not so serious as the labor problem of the North. The Negro is the Southern laborer. His color preserves his class distinction. As a workman, he is fitted for the warm climate and agricultural pursuits of that region. He is shiftless and improvident because so long trained to live dependent upon a master. He is doing better work as an employee than he did as a slave. He is happy, peaceable, and content. There are no socialistic or anarchistic traits in his blood. His wants are few, and he is able to cover a life of hardship and penury with the flowers of melody and the foam of unceasing mirth. The troubles of the South do not arise in the Negro, but in the white men. There is a class of "white trash" who have all the fierce and unruly instincts of that robber race, the Saxons, at whose door the lynchings and political uproars may be faithfully laid. The better element of Southern people have no part in these. Thus it is the same class that raises disturbance in Alabama that does the same in Chicago. The Negro and the better whites have no part in either case. What the final outcome of the race question will be is impossible, of course, to surmise. The probabilities are that the African will remain a hewer of wood and a drawer of water until his face shall pale—and it is paling rapidly—and he shall cease to be a social factor. No two races ever lived antagonistic, yet in contact, without the stronger either annihilating or absorbing the other. (Chicago Conservator.)
The United States and not the Negro is responsible for the Negro's identity with this country and also for his past and present condition in America; and, having of her own accord made us citizens and participants of this government (because we have merited both as slaves in the forest and as armed soldiers and patriots on the field of battle, protecting a flag which up to that time had never offered us protection—by these means we have merited a citizenship) God and the civilized world will hold the United States and the several states responsible as our guardians to the heights of true civilization. As for adaptation to and responsibility of civilization, the Negro is receiving the highest mental and social culture. I call your attention to the thousands of colored professional men and women who are rare models of social culture and intellectual worth—men of learning and distinguished for intelligence, men known and honored by the civilized world for their mental merits. Blind Tom is the greatest musical prodigy the world has ever seen. Regardless of his race and identity, I believe that Rev. J. C. Price, D.D., was as fine an orator as America ever produced, and Douglass the peer of any statesman. There has been something very peculiar about the history of American issues for the last one hundred years. Though the Negro himself has kept silent, yet there has scarcely been in that length of time a decisive issue before the American Congress that would have affected the entire nation that was not either the outcome of our presence in this country or a corollary thereto in some phase. The nation, not the Negro, is responsible for the so-called Negro problem. Therefore it is the nation's problem, and the nation must solve it. America bought the whistle, and she must pay for it. The Negro has been and will ever be the Pharaoh's plague to America, until the nation recognizes the declaration of the fathers and the design of God in bequeathing to all men justice in equity and the fullest recognition of citizenship to all who are made a part of this government by constituency and responsibility. This done, we will have but one problem, and that will be how to better advance the glory of one common union. To-day we stand beneath the American eagle, which bears in his talons the stars and stripes, for which more than two hundred thousand of our fathers and brothers have fallen on yonder battlefields. We stand here begging for peace, protection, and a just recognition of manhood. We stand here under the flag for which our fathers fought in common with the white man, and plead for civil rights. Yea, in the name of God and the blood of our dead we ask a shelter beneath thy wing. Shall the stars of the American flag, our only hope as guides to higher manhood, the reflective rays of American civilization and liberty, hide their shameful faces behind the clouds of American prejudice and bring to us night at noon? Shall your red stripes, O flag! a worthy token of our fathers' blood, which has mingled with the white in all American conflicts, now be used as a signal of welcome and protection to non-Americans, anarchists, and socialists, while the sons of American slaves, soldiers, and citizens are left standing without protection and rightful recognition, reaching forth the brawny hands for labor in vain? O may the goddess of liberty hear us to-day, and may the true American pulse be found forcing life, liberty, and protection through every artery of American sentiment! (Bishop Petty, A. M. E. Zion Church.)
The most important topic that should engage the attention of every Negro throughout the land is, What method can we employ to bring the race problem more practically before the country, and how should we go at it? There must evidently, in all instances, be some way or means of placing all questions before the public in such a manner that all parties may plainly see both sides. As to the race problem, it has never been brought before the public so as to command any serious thought. We shall, of course, have to lay our foundation before we can proceed, as everything must have something to support it. We will say right here that the press is the foundation or starting place in all such cases. A general view of the Negro press will convince one that the race problem has not been handled as it should have been, but it is not too late to make the much needed amends, and now is the time to brace up and come to the front. The newspaper at this time and age of modern predisposition is looked upon as a mighty weapon, but the weak point in Negro journalism is the predominance of petty matters over the more momentous questions that obtain at this time. The race problem has never been appealed to the proper source, and we have never employed the proper methods to touch the pulse of the right class of people. The pulpit has never declared itself on this question, or else the Negro would have been much farther advanced than he is. My idea, or rather the thought that comes to me now, is that the Christian Church should be sounded on the subject of race equality, and there should be some movement instituted among the Negroes of the most populous cities and towns asking the ministers of the white Churches to set aside a special Sabbath to give their views thereon. We are of the opinion that the best step to take would be to organize a club in each city, which shall be invested with the power to appoint a committee to wait on the various ministers. We shall find out then from their pulpits whether the white man considers the colored brother as good as he is. To get the views of the ministers throughout the country on the same day would have a tendency to bring the question squarely and fairly before the nation. These questions may seem a canard to many, but this is the proper step to take and the proper appeal. If we cannot reach the people in this way, why, there are other courses to pursue. We should not despair. If we fail in accomplishing our ends in one manner, we must try other plans, and finally we may be able to touch the right chord. (Dennis S. Thompson, Kansas City, Mo.)
